amy pascal
Big Screen
The Moneyball Saga Continues
4:03PM the cajun boy | Yesterday we posted Sony’s take on why Moneyball, the Soderbergh/Pitt film based on Michael Lewis’ book, died five days before shooting was to start. Now someone close to the project has provided us with a different version of events. More »
Spider-Friends Remember Sony’s Amy Pascal On Her Big Day
7:00AM Defamer Hollywood | The weekly edition of Variety officially awards its Showmen of the Year honour, the most coveted recognition in all of showbiz trade journalism (and yes, that includes Var’s Billion Dollar Director Day celebration), to Sony’s Michael Lynton and Amy Pascal, an occasion necessitating the purchase of full-page tribute ads by any talent, producers, or agency ever hoping to get a movie made at their red-hot studio. While none of the ads make direct mention of Pascal’s ceremonial bepenising by the publication, this minimalist, phoned-in-by-someone’s-unimaginative-assistant offering by Spider-Man’s trio of Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, and Sam Raimi (really, couldn’t someone have thrown some spider-related clip art on there?) nods to the co-president’s honourary gender reassignment, a little in-joke that only those who’ve generated billions in box office grosses can get away without fear of career reprisals. [Ad via Digital Variety] Previously: They Aren’t Kidding When They Say Amy Pascal Can Run A Studio Like A Man [Defamer] More »
Getting To Know Your Showmen Of The Year
6:55AM Defamer Hollywood | While some might find the “some of my favourite things” boxes featured in Variety’s “Showmen of the Year” tribute to Sony heads Amy Pascal and Michael Lynton a feature that might be more at home in Mogul Fancy, the resourceful can always find some utility behind the whimsy: for example, knowing that Harold and Maude inspired Pascal to pursue her wildly successful career in “the biz” could lead a bold producer to begin a pitch by dousing himself in gas and lighting himself on fire or by chopping off his hand with a cleaver, creating an instant bonding moment over a shared love of the cult film. Or, you know, he could just bring along a slice of delicious cake, opting for a safer appeal to her decadent side. (For the record, Lynton’s “favorite things” box indicates he’s more of a ham-and-cheese sandwich guy, Plan your food bribes accordingly.) [Image via Digial Variety] Previously: Spider-Friends Remember Sony’s Amy Pascal On Her Big Day [Defamer] More »
Forbes’ List Of Most Powerful Penis-Lackers Contains Some Unexpected Surprises
5:00AM Defamer Hollywood | The list-compiling obsessives over at Forbes magazine have released their latest masterwork: “The World’s 100 Most Powerful Penisless People,” they call it. Sprinkled among the many businesswomen and politicians are a few familiar names from the showbiz realm, including DreamWorks’s Stacey Snider (#87) and Disney’s Anne Sweeney (#77), CBS’s Nancy Tellem (#49), and Amy Pascal, coming in at an impressive #35, despite Forbes’s editors obviously not being aware that she’d been graduated to full-fledged, junk-swinging man by Variety’s Showmen of the Year nominating committee. The highest ranking entertainment figure was Earthly deity Oprah Winfrey at #21, but the biggest surprise on the chart came in at #24, as Big Brother’s Jew-leery candidate Amber was deemed an even greater feminine force to be reckoned with than Hillary Clinton. Amber 2012! The World’s 100 Most Powerful Women [Forbes] More »
They Aren’t Kidding When They Say Amy Pascal Can Run A Studio Like A Man
7:45AM Defamer Hollywood | We thought it was a little strange when Sony chief Amy Pascal, THR’s Most Powerful Woman in Hollywood 2006 and one of the top-rated honourees in Premiere’s celebration of the industry’s most influential ladies, was left off Variety’s recent Women’s Impact Report, but now it all makes sense: The trade didn’t want to ruin the surprise that it had awarded her its highest honour, an official promotion to Man, for an incredible year of directing her studio to the lead in motion picture marketshare. We congratulate Pascal on this recognition, and can’t wait until someone sends us a cameraphone photo of the many baskets of bananas her new male peers are messengering over to ceremonially welcome her into their fraternity. [Ad via Digital Variety] More »Breaking! ‘Spider-Man’ Sequel Absurdly Expensive
5:11AM Jess McGuire | Given that the first two Spider-Man movies made Sony about $1.6 billion at the worldwide box office, it probably surprises no one to learn that the studio’s relentless pursuit of another huge summer run may have resulted in the third installment becoming The Most! Expensive! Movie! Ever! Made! Still, even if the $350 million number (throw in marketing and promotion and we’re at half a billion) passed along in Kim Masters’ Radar story on Spider-Man 3’s historic, budget-busting run are, is claimed by a flack, a “complete fabrication,” the real amount is still big enough to choke even its free-spending producer:
Still reeling from a flurry of bad press on its PlayStation 3 gaming console, Sony isn’t eager to claim this honor. A studio spokesman angrily rejects the $350 million estimate as a “complete fabrication,” insisting that production costs didn’t exceed $270 million. One of the film’s producers, Laura Ziskin, also disputes the higher total, albeit in a less forceful manner. “I refuse to say the [real] number because it makes me choke,” she tells Radar. Spider-Man 3 was a super-expensive movie–the most expensive film we’ve ever made. But there’s no way you can get to $300 million.”
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